NATION RADIO – OCTOBER 29, 2011

Another week in the NHL season is now in the can and as expected Phil Kessel leads the league in points, Nikolai Khabilbulin has the lowest GAA among goalies and the Oilers are in first place in the West. No, you haven’t accidentally stumbled through a worm hole into a parallel universe.

The first guest this week on NationRadio is Danny Gray of TheLeafsNation who is positively beside himself to talk about the 7-2-1 Toronto Maple Leafs. Other topics of justified humble bragging include the strong play of Phil Kessel and Dion Phaneuf.

Next up on the docket in the Court of Lowetide is a guy who knows a thing or two about a thing or two Kirk Luedeke. Regional scout for Red Line Report; Leudeke and Lowetide give a review of the 2011 NHL draft as teams decide who stays in the NHL and who returns to junior. The dominance of RNH comes up – surprise of surprises.

Jeff Krushell discusses the state of healthiness of the Oilers including the impact of an NHL season’s worth of travel time on an NHL team. Krushell and LT also discuss the injury to Gagner as well as concussion problems and their impact on the game.

Ryan Batty from the Copper n Blue has been described by Lowetide as "always (having) a srong opinion and doesn’t waiver when it is unpopular." We can’t imagine what that would look like but Batty has the gall to come on NationRadio and make a case that Ryan Nugent-Hopkins should have been returned to junior by the Edmonton Oilers.

The main thrust of his argument surrounded the burning of the entry level contract early. It’s the same basic concern as a year ago with Hall, and although I don’t agree with it there’s certainly a case to be made.

Ryan made some secondary suggestions as to development, contracts, etc, but the main one (or at least this is my understanding) surrounds the best time to burn the entry level seasons.

In the case of a first overall pick like Nugent-Hopkins, who has shown the ability to play at the NHL level, I thought your baseball analogy — pushing a player as far along as he can go as long as he shows he’s able to handle it — was easily the strongest point made.

I get where Batty and those who’d rather put off ELCs when possible are coming from, but I don’t think that approach best fits with where this team is at right now and with Hall and Nugent-Hopkins. What makes perfect sense in theory doesn’t always work best with different circumstances and players. One size does not necessarily fit all.

Without Hall and RNH, what does Tambellini have to sell to fans right now after five years out of the playoffs? That’s not a minor consideration. Neither are the potential benefits of giving the kids a chance to develop together.